Reservation control device



1949 J. w. BURGESS, JR

RESERVATION CONTROL DEVICE Filed July 3, 1945 RVAT I ON INVENTOR. 13212" 555, L5?

I ATTORNEYS Patented Dec. 6, 1949 UNITED STATES T OFFICE 1 Claim.

This invention relates to a control device for use in hotels, railway and bus offices, or the like, wherein under current business practices reservations of rooms in a hotel or seats on a particular car are made in advance which practice in volves considerable difficulties for those responsible for the orderly conduct of the business due to the difficulty of keeping the records in a form capable of immediate analysis such as required in the rush of heavy business.

An object of the present invention is to provide a device or" a simple and inexpensive character adapted to display the data showing all reservations made or tentative reservations offered for particular dates and in connection with the par ticular units such as rooms, seats or the like, so that a clerk can readily ascertain at a glance vacancies in particular units for any particular dates and accurately and quickly advise an inquirer of the situation.

The invention consists in the novel construction arrangement and combinations of parts hereinafter more particularly described and claimed.

One sheet of drawings accompanies this specification as part thereof in which like reference characters indicate like parts throughout.

In the drawing:

Fig. 1 is a plan View partly broken away of a reservation board constructed in accordance with the present invention.

Fig. 2 is a vertical cross sectional view taken on line 22 of Fig. 1.

Fig. 3 is a perspective of a convenient device for holding assorted reservation cards for use with the improved board.

In accordance with the present invention, a suitable board I is provided herein illustrated as of rectangular shape and of a length to accommodate a plurality of vertically marked columns one for each day of a month and a plurality of horizontally disposed slots one for each unit, room, car or bus seat to be controlled. The board I may be of any desired configuration subject to having a straight horizontal top edge 6 for reasons hereinafter more fully described.

Upon the face of the board i are secured a plurality of horizontally disposed, angularly disposed and vertically spaced strips 2 which may be of wood or other suitable rigid material and to each of which is secured a frictional surface strip 3 which may be of felt, rubber or other frictional material. The strips 2, with their associated frictional faces are spaced apart to provide angularly disposed card receiving slots in which may be inserted as desired the reservation cards i l or 15. Near the bottom and top of the board 5 are secured guide strips 13 and 22 0f sufiicient thickness to space a T-square sliding thereon above the strips 2 and the cards it which may be interposed between said strips.

Preferably, the board I will be marked at the left hand end with a plurality of horizontal lines corresponding to the slots between the strips 2 and in the spaces ill thus provided will be marked indicia identifying a particular room, car; seat or the like.

Vertical lines ii are marked over the face of the board and the superposed strips 2 defining a plurality of vertically disposed columns one for each day of the month, or M in all. On the upper portions of the board suitable indicia it will be marked in each of these columns to identify the entire column with a particular day of the month.

Slidable over the face of the board is the blade of a T-square upon which blade are a plurality of horizontally disposed lines adapted to coincide with the horizontal slots between the strips 2 and in the spaces between these horizontal lines the blade will preferably be marked with indicia H corresponding with and identifying the unit indicia H on the left side of the board. The head i of this T-square will slidingly engage the upper straight edge 6 of the board and the back of the head may conveniently be provided with a depending flange 9 to hold the T-square in position on the board.

For use on the board, the invention contemplates a plurality of reservation cards I l which reservation cards will be provided in lengths corresponding to the width or" one of the vertical day columns or multiples thereof. A second group of similar cards, but differently colored to distinguish from the reservation cards can be conveniently used in connection with tentative reservations as where inquiries are made in advance as to the possibility of making reservations but no definite reservation is made, such cards may conveniently be red and are indicated at 55.

For conveniently holding a supply of such cards the device of Fig. 3 is compact and convenient. It comprises a container having a front wall it and a relatively tall rear wall l8 with connecting sicewalls l6lfi which side-walls and an intermediate partition it are each provided it inclined front edges 29. Between the side wall. and inter mediate partition are positioned a plurality of shelves 25 which by reason of the inclined front edges of the side walls and partition, will form compartments of various depths in orderly prog- 3 ress from the top to the bottom of the device, which compartments may be conveniently numbered to indicate the unit length of the cards in each particular compartment.

In use and referring to the particular embodiment herein illustrated, the board is designed to control five rooms of a hotel. The room numbers are indicated on the left side of the board and also on the face of the T-square guide member 8. Upon receipt of an inquiry as to the possibility of making a reservation on certain days, a red tentative card I5 will be marked with the name of the inquirer as illustrated: B. K. Swartz, and placed on the board in the slot identifying room 203. Where a definite reservation ismade as in the case of J. A. Smith, in the drawing, a card will be marked by the clerk with-that name and inserted as illustrated to reserve room 201 from noon on the 5th until noon on the 9th as requested by Mr. Smith. By means of the vertical slidable marker, the clerk in reading the board can avoid any mistake in connection with the unit and day slots by sliding the marker to the particular day in question.

With this device, it will be noted that the room or ticket clerk will have always available before him a graphic display of any vacancies in any particular units on any particular day and the chances of mistakes and overlapping reservations can be substantially eliminated.

Various modifications in the precise construction of the parts will readily suggest themselves to those skilled in the art, but within the scope of the present invention as claimed.

Having thus fully described by invention, I claim:

Reservation control board for hotels and the like comprising, a board, a plurality of horizontally disposed and vertically spaced strips disposed in parallel relationship to each other on the face of the board to constitute a plurality of angularly disposed slots, each of said strips formed of a rigid base with a frictional surface face, paralled spaced guide. strips secured adjacent the top and bottom edges of the board with their outer faces in a plane parallel with but spaced outwardly from the plane defined by said angularly disposed strips, a plurality of cards of uniform width adapted to be selectively positioned in said angularly disposed slots with their outer edges in a-plane intermediate the planes defined by said angularly disposed strips and said guidestrips and a T-square slidable on said guide strips over said selectively positioned cards.

JOHN W. BURGESS, JR.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 277,292 Knight May 8, 1883 444,396 Hull Jan. 6, 1891 1,194,629 Hodges Aug. 15, 1916 1,207,711 Clark Dec. 12,- 1916 1,383,492 Seely Ju1y 5, 1921 

